Ice Cube challenges Olympic 3×3 basketball winner to play vs. Big3

The United States is struggling more than expected in the 3×3 basketball competition at the 2024 Paris Olympics, and Ice Cube believes he has the solution. The rapper and actor, who founded the Big3 basketball league seven years ago, thinks his best players need to be included when the Olympics come to Los Angeles in 2028. 
Ice Cube is so confident about this that Friday, during an appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show,” he challenged the gold medal winner in men’s 3×3 basketball this year to a high-stakes exhibition game later this month before the Big3’s championship game takes place in Boston on Aug. 18. 
McAfee offered to give the winning team $100,000. Ice Cube pledged to pay all expenses and chip in additional money for the winning team.    
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“We’ll get the players that’s ready to go, ready to represent the United States, and bring some respect, put some respect on the name,” Ice Cube said. “At the end of the day, we’re not seeing the best that we have in Paris and that’s because of pettiness and politics, and it seems like the guys would rather not get the Big3 credit instead of bringing a gold medal home. That’s more important than this pettiness.”
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“These guys don’t get paid a lot,” he added, “so they should jump at the challenge.”
Ice Cube has a longstanding beef with the NBA because of its refusal to embrace the Big3, despite the rosters of its teams being littered with former NBA players. He believes the NBA’s influence on USA basketball has prevented the Big 3 from being involved in this relatively new Olympic event, which was introduced at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. 
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The United States got off to a terrible start in this year’s Games. The men’s team featuring Jimmer Fredette, Dylan Travis, Canyon Berry and Kareem Maddox sits in fifth place in pool play with a 2-4 record, as of Friday. The Team USA women’s 3×3 team featuring Hailey Van Lith, Rhyne Howard, Cierra Burdick and Dearica Hamby has a 3-3 record and finds itself in fourth place with a 3-3 record. 
The top two teams in pool play advance to the semifinals, while the next four qualify for play-in games that determine the other two semifinal spots.
Rosters for 3×3 basketball in the Olympics are determined by accruing points that can only be earned in other sanctioned 3-on-3 basketball events. That’s why current NBA players have yet to represent the United States in 3×3 basketball in Tokyo or Paris. 
“We feel like they should have the Big 3 players in the Olympics,” Ice Cube said. “We do have the best 3-on-3 players in the world, and it’s not even close.”